Grant: Project Grant

Heart valves help control blood flow through the heart and, if diseased, may need to be replaced. After having a heart valve replaced, patients have a higher risk of death than people who have not had a valve replaced. In young adult patients, replacing the aortic heart valve with a mechanical valve halves their life-span compared to other people their age. Mechanical valves tend to form blood clots so they need long-term blood thinners that increase risk of bleeding and lower quality of life. Animal tissue valves reduce clotting and bleeding risks but wear out sooner and shorten patient life-span. An operation, called the Ross procedure, replaces a patient's diseased aortic valve with his/her own pulmonary valve and uses a donor valve in the pulmonary position which receives less stress than the aortic valve. The Ross procedure aims to improve valve durability with less clotting, avoiding use of blood thinners. Patients and physicians need a large, high-quality study comparing the Ross procedure and standard valve replacement to know if either approach is better. We will perform a 3-year feasibility study in seven sites, in Canada and abroad, to test the study design and ability to do a larger, conclusive study comparing the impact of the Ross procedure to standard valve replacement on survival without valve-related life-threatening complications. Patients will be randomized, like flipping a coin, to receive the Ross or standard valve surgery. The goals are 1) to evaluate if we can recruit 6 patients per site per year, 2) to test if the assigned procedure is performed in over 90% of study patients, and 3) to see how many mechanical vs. tissue valves are used in the standard valve group. Patients eligible but not enrolled in the trial will be asked if we can collect some data on how they do after their surgery. If we show the study is feasible, we will request funds for the full study and will include the feasibility patients in the full study.